For the past 10.5 months I have struggled to describe what life is like here. Struggled to explain the mountain highs and valley lows. Struggled to accept that feelings of loneliness, homesickness, or defeat were real, and yet were taking root at the same time as feelings of belonging and victory. You see, my life here is the epitome of contradictory.
The physical environment of Ethiopia is one huge paradox: amazing, breathtaking beauty met against immense poverty and filth. My life--especially me emotions--hang in the balance between loving my life here and wondering what in the world I was thinking taking on something so much bigger than I am. And yet, admitting the down sides to life here somehow made me feel like I was affirming the doubters, implying that I couldn't do what I set out to do, or even somehow sharing that I was not happy in God's plan. And yet now looking back I realize that was pride and the reality is the complete opposite. The moment when I accepted that all of these feelings and emotions were real was the moment that I could embrace the good with the bad. Then suddenly I could accept that the happiness that overtook me ran just as deep as my occasional loneliness in a world so different from my own. The certainty about being exactly where God wanted me was solid, and yet just as firm was the fact that I sometimes wondered what on earth I was doing here. The frustration that threatened to take control of me at times was just as true as the unbounded joy I felt at other times. The truth is... I love my life here, but compared to the life I left behind, this one is hard!
There is something freeing about accepting the contradictions that have come to define my life in Ethiopia. Embracing them has allowed me to feel an indescribable assurance that I am indeed where God wants me for this season. Through the ups and downs He is molding me and shaping me into the person He desires for me to be. Though contradictory and far from anything I have experienced ever before, I am assured beyond all understanding that this is the place I was born to be for this season... And that is a good feeling. This life that challenges me each and every day is the same life that brings me the ultimate fulfillment--fulfillment in Christ.
